I had simply played a part since that night with Miller in my office.
I created a wide berth around Jules. I stopped organizing her desk stuff. I stopped hanging with her when I could have been in my own office. Since I couldn’t just suddenly stop ordering from her favorite lunch places, I just started to go out right before like I had work to do, sitting down at the local sub shop all by myself like a loser instead.
I stopped talking about her.
I attempted to look like I noticed her less.
I played a part.
Apparently, convincingly enough.
“Jules wanted to know if there was any way someone could tell everyone to go ahead and have a nice meal on her. Maybe have Gunner spread the news. He likes being the bearer of bad news.”
“Yeah, no worries. Will we be seeing you at the party?”
“I’m gonna give Jules a ride to the airport. But if I get back in time…”
“Sounds good. I’ll save you some not-wedding cake.”
“Thanks, Miller.”
With that, I made my way to the office, throwing myself into research on the guy who broke Jules’ heart – even if she was too focused on the money to realize it yet.
Gary Truman.
Thirty-two.
And, well, to his conman credit, just enough came up.
Just enough to convince any girl who searched his name that he was legit. And unmarried.
He had all the right social media accounts – Facebook, Instagram, a Twitter that he never posted on.
The right stuff with some pictures, some shared posts.
Not a lot, but passable.
Women accepted that most guys didn’t update as often as they did, didn’t do selfies, didn’t add in all the work and life information.
Nothing about this Gary Truman would set up red flags unless you knew to look for them.
Because his oldest post was about two and a half years before. Likely around the time he met Jules. He’d uploaded, shared, and posted a lot those first two weeks, giving the appearance of a longer period of time if someone wasn’t investigating enough to look at the dates.
And outside of social media, there was nothing. No old defunct LinkedIn pages; no links to old blogs or newspaper articles about how he hit the home run in a game in high school.
In fact, the only other posts about Gary Truman, aged thirty-two, belonged to someone in jail for armed robbery.
He was a ghost in a day and age when it was impossible to be a ghost.
I took a picture off his account, uploading it to a friend who had done some work for me in the past, grabbed my laptop, stuffed it into my backpack, and headed back to my car, grabbing salads on the way – hers with romaine, spinach, carrots, cucumbers, almonds, and honey mustard dressing, mine with iceberg, croutons, and ranch because salads were, well, tasteless and pointless without some bread and fat.
I got there about half an hour after I left, hoping she’d taken the time to maybe cry it out in the shower in private, but hadn’t fallen into some kind of depression over the whole thing.
The sooner we got to work on this, the better the chances of finding Gary before the money was all gone.
I let myself back in, closing the door quietly.
“Jules?” I called, putting the salads down on the island beside her half-drank, now cold coffee. “I’m back,” I added when I got no response, waiting for her, not wanting to go in search of her only to find her in a weak moment she might not want me to share.
I could hear movement a moment later, footsteps coming closer. Not heels, as was her usual, but I figured maybe she just hadn’t slipped them on yet.
I couldn’t have expected sneakers.
Or, well, any other part of the Jules that came around the bend of the kitchen, and into my line of sight.
Because Jules, well, Jules liked her image. She put time and thought into her outfits, her hair, her makeup, her jewelry selection. There was never a day when she showed up to work after too-little sleep with a look that clearly said ‘screw it.’
She always had on work attire – dresses or slacks with blouses or blazers.
Even when she was called in at two a.m. when there was an emergency client, she somehow managed to slip into a dress, pull her hair back, put on heels, and fix her makeup, and still be there in under twenty minutes.
That was just how she was.
Or so I thought.
Had I not been so distracted by her on her knees in her wedding dress, I might have noticed that her closet did boast things that others might consider daily outfits, but Jules would likely call leisure wear.
Because, apparently, it was there.
I knew that because Jules was wearing it.
Light wash jean capris – neither tight nor loose, just skimming the gentle curves of her body, the cuff falling just below her knee, exposing a few inches of her lower leg and ankle before you found pure white – so white she either never wore them before, or was obsessive about bleaching them – low sneakers.